Framingham violinist earns spot as prestigious Tanglewood Music Center fellow this summer
Violinist Paul Halberstadt freely admits that his biggest professional dream would be to play with his “hometown orchestra,” the Boston Symphony Orchestra.
While the 24-year-old Framingham native may not be a BSO player just yet, he is getting the chance to learn from, and play alongside, current orchestra members this summer as a Tanglewood Music Center fellow in Lenox, the summer home of the BSO.
“Most orchestral musicians consider Tanglewood Music Center to be the premier summer music fellowship program in the country,” explained Halberstadt by telephone from the Berkshires recently.
Serge Koussevitzky, BSO music director from 1924 to 1949, founded the Tanglewood Music Center (TMC) in 1940 as a preeminent music academy where the emerging generation of great instrumentalists, singers, conductors and composers, who had completed their formal study, would have access to the resources of a great symphony orchestra and could refine their skills under the mentorship of BSO musicians and other music luminaries.
The first class of TMC fellows included Leonard Bernstein, who went on to become one of the most important conductors of the 20th century and one of the most talented and successful musicians in American history.
Other prominent TMC alumni include operatic sopranos Phyllis Curtin and Leontyne Price, baritone Sherrill Milnes, composer Luciano Berio, conductors Claudio Addabo, Zubin Mehta, composer and conductor Lukas Foss, composer John Harbison, and conductor, composer and violinist Lorin Maazel.
According to a recent study commissioned by the BSO, some 20% of the members of major American symphony orchestras, and nearly 25% of all first-chair players, studied at the TMC.
“The TMC orchestra is a training orchestra under the BSO. We work on different days than the BSO, which gives us the chance to connect with the world’s greatest conductors, soloists and orchestral musicians,” says Halberstadt. “It’s a major step between school and a career.”
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For Halberstadt, who has studied with BSO violinist Bonnie Bewick, among others, this year includes the opportunity to work with BSO music director Andris Nelsons.
“Andris Nelsons is one of the best conductors in the world today. He couldn’t be more knowledgeable, or kind for that matter.
“He conducted our big concert, Mahler’s Symphony No. 5, in the Koussevitzky Music Shed on July 23, says Halberstadt. “And in preparation for that concert, he also conducted our rehearsals and was around to answer any questions we had.”
Halberstadt held his first violin at age 4 at an “instrument petting zoo” at Indian Hill Music, now the Groton Music Center, in Littleton, and was soon signed up by his parents – father Andrew, a French horn player and computer scientist at MathWorks in Natick, and mother Sandra, a part-time music director at Westgate Church in Weston – at the Suzuki School in Newton.
A 2016 graduate of Framingham High School, where he excelled as a track and field athlete, Halberstadt earned his Bachelor of Music degree in violin performance at Eastman School of Music in Rochester, New York, his parents’ alma mater, and a master’s degree in violin performance from the Cleveland Institute of Music.
While concertmaster with the National Festival Orchestra at the National Orchestral Institute (NOI), Halberstadt led the orchestra in a Grammy-nominated performance of “An American in Paris,” released on the Naxos label. He also performed with the Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra on its Grammy Award-winning album, “American Rapture,” on the Azica label.
He was recently named associate concertmaster for the Alabama Symphony Orchestra. Halberstadt and his wife, pianist and teacher Evelyn – married Nov. 21, 2021 and expecting their first child this November – will make their home in Birmingham. For now, though, they’re enjoying their summer at Tanglewood.
“My time here is very busy, of course, with rehearsals, concerts, master classes, and practice time, but when I have free time, Evelyn and I can very frequently be found on the lawn,” says Halberstadt. “We attend maybe seven or eight concerts a week.”
And while those concerts involve Halberstadt’s professional dream, the BSO, his companion represents his personal dream.
“Career-wise, I would love one day to be a violinist with the BSO. Personally, however, Evelyn and I really look forward to raising a family. That’s been a long-held dream of mine, too,” says the proud father-to-be.
In addition to Paul Halberstadt, other local fellows at the TMC this summer include pianist Diana Borshcheva, of Needham; harpist Deanna Cirielli, of Duxbury; tenor Matthew Corcoran, of Ipswich; pianist Elias Dagher, of Quincy; double bassist Christopher Laven, of Wayland; and horn player Helen Wargelin of Concord.
If you go: Tanglewood Music Center
WHEN: Through Aug. 14
WHERE: Tanglewood, 297 West St. Lenox
TICKETS: Admission to TMC 10 a.m. Sunday morning chamber concerts and 8 p.m. vocal concerts is free. Admission to 6 p.m. Saturday concerts is free but restricted to that evening’s 8 p.m. concert ticket holders. For tickets to TMC events and other Tanglewood events, visit https://www.bso.org/events
INFO: 617-266-1200, tanglewood.org
This article originally appeared on MetroWest Daily News: Framingham violinist plays with BSO's Tanglewood Music Center Lenox
